New York:
In an eating competition between humans and elephants held in New York City on Friday, the elephants were the winners.
Three circus elephants scored a decisive victory over three human competitive eaters at a cross-species eating contest, consuming 505 hot dog buns in six minutes.
The humans forced down only 143 buns in the bout at Brooklyn's Coney Island.
The elephants, Bunny, Susie and Minnie, all in their 40s, ate at what appeared to be a leisurely pace from behind a table piled high with buns.
They even paused to eat some fresh fruit, which was not counted in the scoring.
Their human competitors were far more focused.
Eric Booker, a New York City subway conductor who is the world champion in corned beef hash eating, took a double-fisted approach, dipping two buns at once into liquid to make them easier to swallow.
Juliet Lee, a petite 43-year-old who started the contest with her midriff exposed, pushed several buns into her stretched mouth simultaneously.
Originally from China, Lee is the world cranberry sauce champion, a title she won by eating 13.23 pounds (six kilograms) of the sauce in eight minutes.
Tim Brown, whose claim to fame is having eaten 8.47 pounds (3.84 kilograms) of blueberry pie in an eight-minute, hands free competition, completed the human team.
Friday's match was sponsored by Major League Eating and Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey.
George Shea, of Major League Eating, the organiser of the event, said he was surprised at the result.
"I expected that even though the weight was an unbelievable mismatch, nine tonnes to 600 pounds, I expected that the humans could win," he said.
According to the organisers, the humans weighed about 600 pounds (272 kilograms) collectively, while the Asian elephants weighed about nine tonnes.